What’s one way of getting a street gang’s attention? By hitting them (too) close to home. That’s the strategy outlined by Terry O’Quinn‘s Sam Chapel, the leader of Los Angeles’ elite Gang Task Force, in this first look from Fox’s Gang Related (premiering Thursday at 9/8c).

In the new drama, Ramon Rodriguez (The Wire) plays Detective Ryan Lopez, a rising star on the Gang Task Force who long before he became a cop, pledged his allegiance to a powerful Latino gang called Los Angelicos. Even when Ryan’s police partner is killed by a notorious thug, he finds himself still beholden to the gang’s leader, Javier Acosta (Trauma’s Cliff Curtis), a father figure who secretly masterminded Ryan’s entry into the police force. But as the series unfolds, Ryan comes to suspect he may be more dedicated to being a cop than he is to Los Angelicos.

As Chapel, Lost alum O’Quinn plays another surrogate father figure to Ryan. Here, the task force boss outlines a new plan of attack on gangs’ irreplaceable assets — family, including Acosta’s own.

over under on number of episodes is 6.5.
Typical FOX -take a decent show and delay airing it forever.
Between this and Surviving Jack, FOX once again proves that the Empire is in disarray.
With AI on its last legs, the network should get into the nurturing business.
It isn’t rocket surgery…

It’s so frustrating to me that the networks won’t take the time to nurture their comedies. Surviving Jack was easily the funniest new show of the season with a great cast and concept but as expected, that late midseason premiere in April killed it. I think beyond a doubt that if FOX would have given it a second chance with a fall relaunch it would have done very well and built its audience unlike FOX’s other struggling comedies. This was a big blunder on FOX’s part. I also would have liked to see the 6 episodes of Us and Them but FOX never did get around to broadcasting them.